All posts tagged fishing

A sushi restaurant chain owner paid ¥4.51 million ($37,500) for a 180 kilogram Bluefin tuna at the first auction of the year in Tokyo’s Tsukiji fish market.

Kiyoshi Kimura, president of Kiyomura Co., has won the year’s first bid for four consecutive years since 2012. He told reporters Monday after his purchase that it was cheaper than he had expected thanks to a successful haul of tuna near the Tsugaru strait this year. Read More »

A fisheries cooperative association in Hokkaido said it caught a basking shark on Monday so big that they couldn’t even weigh it.

The 8.8 meter shark, found trapped in gill nets, was dead by the time it was brought on shore, a fisheries cooperative official at the city of Rausu, located in the northeastern part of the island said. Read More »

Rich with vitamins and minerals, eels are credited by many Japanese people for helping them stay in good health and maintain their skin complexion. But eel stocks have plummeted rapidly in recent years and the country is now facing losing the traditional delicacy, which is typically enjoyed in the hot and humid summer.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature added the Japanese eel to its list of endangered species on Wednesday, citing “loss of habitat, overfishing, barriers to migration, pollution and changes to oceanic currents.” Although the list has no legal power, it may help raise awareness about the issue among the international community. Read More »

Recent decisions by two local fishing cooperatives to delay a resumption of fishing near the Fukushima nuclear plant highlight the confusion over ocean contamination. The cooperatives decided not to fish in the area because they have no hope of selling their catch, not because marine life in the area is unsafe to eat.

The decisions suggest it is the perception of a health risk not an actual health risk per se that is limiting fishing in the area. But safety concerns have also strengthened recently following leaks of contaminated water at the plant that its operator said could have reached the seawater enclosed by the plant’s port. The latest leaks prompted South Korea to ban imports of marine products from the area.

Amid this ongoing uncertainty over the safety of produce from the seas around Fukushima, Japan’s nuclear watchdog has decided to integrate existing monitoring efforts and present a clearer picture of the situation. Read More »

China may have felt it had bigger fish to fry last week when it gave a low-key response to a maritime deal between Japan and Taiwan on access to waters near disputed islands in the East China Sea.

Perhaps China had its attention focused on the volatile Korean peninsula, which was looking unusually unstable and in need of urgent attention. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry was on his way to Beijing to huddle with the Chinese to ensure that crisis didn’t get out of hand. And perhaps Beijing felt there was no need to muddy the waters at that point.

Beijing has maintained that low-key stance but it hasn’t been ready to let the fishing issue sink completely from sight.

In Minamisanriku, Tadakiyo Kudo lost everything to the tsunami that struck Japan six months ago, including his oyster company. Now, he and other fishermen are seeing improving prospects for their industry as they rebuild. WSJ’s Cheng Herng Shinn reports. Read More »

The decision was seen as an affront to the northeastern fishing industry, already severely afflicted by the March 11 tsunami. Some 10 fishing ports along the Fukushima Prefecture coastline sustained “catastrophic damage,” which has reached nearly 81 billion yen, roughly $950 million, in damage costs, according to Japan’s Fisheries Agency Wednesday.

In response, the Fukushima fisheries group sent a letter protesting the decision to pour the irradiated water into the sea on Monday night.

The English translation of the letter, which was obtained and reviewed by JRT, is published in full after the jump. Read More »

Radioactive water is streaming into the sea in Japan as workers struggle to clear out toxic pools around the reactors. WSJ’s Jake Schlesinger and Yumiko Ono discuss why this is happening and how it’s affecting the local fishing industry.

Makoto Endo, a 69-year-old fisherman in the town of Ishinomaki, Miyagi prefecture, decided to move to the mountains after the tsunami swept away his house, his four fishing boats and his fishery on March 11. He says he doesn’t want to see the sea any more. Read More »

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